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Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson got emotional after The Smashing Machine’s screening in Venice. Earlier this week, The Rock spoke out about getting out of his comfort zone to portray MMA legend Mark Kerr in the upcoming movie.
“I just had this burning desire and voice that was saying, ‘What if there is more and what if I can?’ A lot of times, it’s harder for us — or at least for me — to know what you’re capable of when you’ve been pigeonholed into something,” he said. “Sometimes it takes people that who you love and respect, like Emily and Benny, to say that you can.”
“I looked around a few years ago and I started to think, you know, am I living my dream or am I living other people’s dreams? You come to that recognition and I think you can either fall in line — ‘Well, it’s status quo, things are good, I don’t want to rock the boat’ — or go, I want to live my dreams now and do what I wanna do and tap into the stuff that I want to tap into, and have a place finally to put all this stuff that I’ve experienced in the past that I’ve shied away from. I’ve been scared to go deep and intense and raw until now, until I had this opportunity.”
@hollywoodreporter #dwaynejohnson talks about being pigeon-holed in hollywood and feeling like he had something more to prove at the #venicefilmfestival press conference for #thesmashingmachine #venezia82 #venicefilmfestival2025
♬ original sound – The Hollywood Reporter – The Hollywood Reporter
After Monday’s screening of ‘The Smashing Machine’ at the Venice Film Festival, The Rock and his co-stars received a 15-minute standing ovation, and the former WWE superstar shed tears of joy while being honored by the crowd.
Dwayne Johnson weeps during the 15-minute #Venezia2025 standing ovation for ‘The Smashing Machine.’ This was the most emotion we’ve since on the Lido since Brendan Fraser launched his Oscar campaign here four years ago for ‘The Whale.’ pic.twitter.com/BzAjB4v6uk
— Ramin Setoodeh (@RaminSetoodeh) September 1, 2025
The Rock has been receiving rave reviews for his portrayal of Kerr and appears to be generating Oscar buzz for his performance.
‘THE SMASHING MACHINE’ debuts with 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Described as having a spectacular career-best performance from Dwayne Johnson.
Read our review: https://t.co/ejtQIs1Usz pic.twitter.com/mYlj9ZVrVf
— DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) September 1, 2025